


When in Doubt, Say it with Flowers

by Lady Divine Coldflash (fhartz91)



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Flower Shop, Crush at First Sight, Len and Mick are basically the same, M/M, Robbery gone wrong, but Barry doesn't expressly have powers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-17
Updated: 2016-10-17
Packaged: 2018-08-23 00:44:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8307292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fhartz91/pseuds/Lady%20Divine%20Coldflash
Summary: In the middle of robbing a flower shop, Len gets confronted by a naive customer looking for a subtle way to break up with his rich boyfriend...and Len spots an opportunity.(Inspired by the post http://justnightwingit.tumblr.com/post/145913005019/flower-shop-au.)





	

“Mick! This is taking too long!” Len hisses, impatiently scoping foot traffic, keeping an eye out for anything suspicious. “Where are they?”

“I’m lookin’, I’m lookin’…” Mick grumbles, searching the floor beneath his scarred palms for a loose tile, a phony board, anything that could conceal a secret stash.

“You’ve been looking for twenty-five minutes! What’s the hold up?”

“It ain’t where it’s supposed to be.”

“You said your intel was _reliable_ ,” Len growls, rolling his eyes after he hears his partner ram his head into a corner.

“It _is_ good,” Mick groans.

“If we take too much longer sniffin’ around, someone might get suspicious.”

“No one’s comin’ in here. We put a sign up on the door.”

“Like anyone reads signs anymore,” Len gripes. He eyes the sign in question – CLOSED FOR FAMILY BUSINESS - taped to the glass in a way that obscures his face peeking out behind the door frame. The cashier who opened the shop this morning, Penny Pingleton, is knocked out cold and tied up in the utility closet. By Len’s calculations, she should stay unconscious for at least another hour. As per Mick’s _reliable intel,_ she’s the only employee scheduled until five, which is when the shop closes - approximately three hours from now. The man who actually owns the shop, Brett Hastings, is on vacation in Palm Beach.

That’s where Len’s beginning to suspect their payday has gone.

“By the way,” Len starts, posing a question he realizes too late he should have asked before, “why is someone gonna store half a mill in blood diamonds in a _flower shop_?”

“Well, _you_ don’t believe they’re here,” Mick replies, moving his search past the beige floral-and-paisley curtain that divides the shop from the work space in back. “Who else is gonna?”

Len raises a brow and nods his head sideways. “Good point.”

While Mick putters amidst buckets of decorative greenery and baby’s breath, Len mentally divides the people walking by the florist’s shop as potential threats and non-threats. Realistically, anyone can be a threat if they get in Len and Mick’s way, but the more immediate threats Len keeps closer tabs on.

And there’s one now.

A beat cop, his hand on the butt of his sidearm, talking into a radio. But he races by without even a glance at the shop.

Not a threat…for now. But in the area.

An older woman with curly white hair, walking some breed of unnaturally miniature dog, _also_ with curly white hair. They’re both wearing matching red plaid coats.

Obnoxious, but not a threat.

A harried-looking mother pushing an infant in a stroller and towing her four-year-old(ish) daughter by one arm. The mother seems to be having an animated discussion over a cell phone wedged between her shoulder and her ear. The little girl is eating a soft pretzel. The girl looks his way, but Len doesn’t think she sees him. No expression of discovery blooms on her face the way it does on most kids when they see something they don’t think anyone else does.

Not a threat.

Another cop, this one a plain clothes officer. Len can make him off the bat by the way he walks, the way he constantly scans the area, the way he periodically presses on his right ear, his eyes flicking towards the roof of a nearby building. He’s probably wearing an ear piece. The CCPD must be searching for someone.

That’s fine, as long as they’re not looking for him and Mick.

Still, a potential threat.

Four kids on skateboards; a woman in a lavender pant suit trying to fold a newspaper; two teenagers walking arm in arm, sharing a headset and listening to an mp3 player…

All non-threats.

A guy catapults onto the scene that catches Len’s eye and holds on fairly steadily – late twenties (which some people might say is too young for Len seeing as Len’s in his early forties, but that’s why Len doesn’t hang out with many people aside from Mick…), dresses like he’s in college (tattered blue jeans, a red-flannel hanging open over a white t-shirt, and a pair of black Converse sneakers), handsome in that goofball-geek sort of way, brown hair, green eyes…

Len likes green eyes.

…fit, like he runs track, or swims maybe…

Len likes that, too.

…bumbling around, searching for _something_ , checking the signs above the buildings against a listing on his phone.

 _That_ Len doesn’t like.

“Mick…” Len gives the man outside one last long up and down look “…cops are looking for someone. This neighborhood’s too hot. Plan’s a bust.”

“Give me… _urgh_ …a few more minutes,” Mick calls from between two giant plaster urns overflowing with fake cattails, one shedding fluff all over his back. “I think… _mmf_ …I found the safe.”

Len leaves his post. He leaps over the counter and storms behind the curtain to scold his partner face-to-face. “I don’t care if you’ve found Capone’s vault, Geraldo, we’ve gotta go…”

The tinkling of reindeer bells, the silver ones hanging over the front door, forces both men to freeze.

“Hey!” a man’s voice calls out, a _young_ man’s voice, and Len begins to wonder…could it possibly be…

Mick pulls out his heat gun, but Len shakes his head, reaching for his cold gun holstered to his thigh. If they’re going to get out of this without attracting that police attention outside, they probably don’t want to set the whole place on fire.

“I thought you locked the door,” Len growls.

“I thought _you_ locked the door,” Mick volleys. “You’re the one’s been standing next to it for the last thirty minutes. Couldn’t you check?”

Len is tempted to blast his partner in the ass, but he reconsiders. He can’t carry Mick, and despite this major fuck up, he’s not going to leave him behind. Besides, if he wants to shoot him in a place that won’t do much damage, he’ll aim for his head.

The voice calls out again. “I need to buy some flowers and I’m kind of in a hurry. Can someone help me?”

Mick stands, sending a cloud of white fluff floating everywhere, and both men peek out through the curtain. Mick isn’t too impressed by the lanky-looking kid wearing faux Seattle grunge, circa Nirvana, standing in front of the counter.

Len, on the other hand, can’t help grinning.

“We’re closed,” Len says without making himself visible. “Didn’t you see the sign on the door?”

“Oh…uh…” the man twists his head and looks back the way he came. “No. No, I didn’t. I’m sorry. But uh…since you’re here, can you help me?” The man flashes a pleading smile. “If you don’t mind?”

Len quickly works through a handful of scenarios in his head, weighing the pros and cons of kicking this man out versus lending him a hand. Pros – in the few minutes it takes for Len to find out what this guy wants, they locate the diamonds, and meanwhile, Len gets a couple of minutes alone with a handsome young man. Cons – the kid’s a cop (unlikely, but possible) and he makes them out as criminals in a second.

Len and Mick haven’t pulled a job in Central City for a few years now. By all accounts, they’re just passing through. Is it worth taking the chance of ending up in lockup over one guy considering the amount of action he can rustle up at a bar on any given night?

Meh. It’s a tie. Helping this guy out will only take Len about five minutes, tops. How much more damage can they do in that amount of time that they haven’t already done?

“Give me a minute,” he says. “I’ll see what I can do.”

“Just put him on ice,” Mick grumbles, eyes darting to Len’s gun as Len throws on a green canvas apron hanging on a nail in the wood of the doorway.

“Nah. I’ll get rid of him. You keep workin’ on that safe.”

Mick’s eyes narrow as he watches Len tug the apron to check that it covers his weapon. “Why the sudden change of heart, Snart?”

“No, change of heart,” Len mutters, tying the apron strings behind his back. “It’s a simple matter of we invested time looking for this safe, and you found it. We might as well give cracking it a shot.”

Mick huffs. “I would say that’s a reasonable plan if I didn’t think you were doing some of your thinking with your dick.”

Len rolls his eyes. He might comment likewise considering how hard Mick was drooling over the blonde bartender at Saints and Sinners last night, but they don’t have time for jabs. “Stop being a jealous ex-wife, Mick, and get back to the safe.”

Len walks into the shop, approaching the glum young man leaning forward with his elbows on the counter. Len smiles as relaxed and nonchalant a smile as he can muster and says, “How may I help you, sir?”

“Um…Barry. My name’s Barry.” The man smiles. It’s a sad smile, but a sweet smile, twitching slightly at the corners as if it’s taking him all of his energy to keep it there.

“Hello, _Barry_ ,” Len repeats. “What can I do for you today?”

“How do you say _fuck you_ with flowers?”

Len’s relaxed expression goes cold. “ _Excuse_ me?” Out of habit, he reaches for his gun.

“I’m sorry if that sounded rude,” Barry says, not noticing the switch in Len’s demeanor, “it’s just…this guy I was dating, he…” Barry looks nervously down at the counter, tracing scratches in the surface with his index finger, “I found out that he’s been cheating on me.”

“That blows, man,” Len says. “Sorry about that.”

“Thanks,” Barry replies, not sounding too consoled.

“So, what did he say when he found out you knew?”

“He…doesn’t know that I know yet,” Barry admits. He looks at Len with sorrowful eyes, and the smile on Len’s face starts to dip for him. “The thing is, I…well I’ve never been really good with confrontation, so I thought, maybe, I could send him a bouquet of flowers that relays the message, sort of subtly though. To be honest…I’m kinda on the wire as to what I want to do about all of this.”

“Why not send him a dozen dead roses and write _fuck you_ on the card?”

At Len’s suggestion, Barry’s eyes brighten.

“That sounds like a funny idea actually.” Barry snickers, and Len smiles. Oddly enough, it feels good making Barry laugh – a nice contrast to the rest of this shit-bag afternoon. “And I would totally do that. It’s just, he’s kind of…well…” Barry bounces his head back and forth along with some appropriate words and phrases in his brain “…uptight, to be honest; a little controlling…”

“Controlling how?” Len keeps up the small talk for as long as he can as part of the front (or so he tells himself). As it is, with Mick quietly working on the safe, Len has no idea how close they may be to success. He should probably just tell Barry he can’t help him, and to go.

But he can’t. He feels involved now.

“He’s always trying to pick out my clothes, fix my hair, change my cologne. He tells me who I can and can’t be friends with. He says he has an image he needs to uphold, and apparently…I don’t fit that.”

“What sort of image?” Len asks, this time from a place of genuine curiosity.

“Well…” Barry chuckles. This one isn’t sweet. It turns dry and bitter quick “…he’s kind of…rich. Like, really rich?” Len’s eyes pop open, but not to where Barry would notice. _An asshole and rich…well, well, well…hello, payday._ “He’s always telling me how immature I am, how unsophisticated. He even used the word _gauche_ once. I didn’t think people still used that word. So, yes, I want to tell him to _fuck off_ , but with a little more…class. You know?”

Mick emerges from behind the curtain. He stops at the counter, opening random drawers, rummaging for something.

“He sounds like a real prick, kid,” Mick adds, grabbing a handful of paperclips out of the bottom drawer for no reason that Len can understand and returning to his work. “You’re better off without him.”

“Thanks,” Barry says, seemingly oblivious to the man who looks like the very definition of a thug who’s just strolled in and out, and Len begins to think he and his cohort have nothing to worry about from Barry.

So chatting with him a bit longer won’t hurt.

“Look, I get ya, Barry,” Len says, pulling from semi-personal experience in order to sympathize. His baby sister Lisa’s scumbag boyfriend just broke up with her a few days ago, and she’s been sitting in her room with a rotating carton of ice-cream, sulking ever since. Taking this ill-advised job today was, in part, an effort to keep from going down to the loser’s apartment and breaking his legs. “ _Break ups_ suck,” Len says with emphasis, hoping Barry will take the hint, “but believe you me, I think this guy deserves it.”

“You think so? Because the popular opinion is that I’m lucky to have him.”

“Not a chance. That guy doesn’t deserve a catch like you. And…” Len grins, dialing down the sinister in his default sly grin a few notches “…I think I know _exactly_ what to do. So why don’t you leave it to us. We’ll get your message across.”

Barry looks at Len, sneaky grin and all, with honest, grateful eyes. “That would be…that would be great. I can’t even tell you how much that means…”

“Don’t sweat it. It’ll be our pleasure.”

“How much do I owe you?” Barry asks, reaching for his back pocket. This would be a perfect opportunity to swipe Barry’s credit card number, but Len doesn’t want to. Even if Len is a career criminal, he’s not interested in being _that_ big a douche today. Barry seems like a nice guy. Len wasn’t lying when he said that Barry didn’t deserve to be treated like shit. With his eyes on a bigger prize and an opportunity to possibly scratch two itches at once, Len waves Barry’s wallet away.

“Don’t worry about it, kid,” Len says with a wink. “We’ve got you covered. It’s on the house.”

Barry’s bottom jaw drops. “Really?”

“Really. Just leave us the address where you want it delivered, and we’ll make sure we get to your _ex’s_ house ASAP.” Len passes Barry a notepad from beside the cash register, and hands him a pen from a nearby cup – a whimsical pen wrapped in green florist tape with a bobbing fake gerbera on top. This cup of stupid ass pens was one of the first things Len and Mick noticed when they broke into the place. Mick said he wanted to set the thing on fire.

Len agrees with him. These things are tacky as shit. They’re giving him a rash. They need to die.

“That’s…that’s just…awesome of you guys,” Barry says, writing down a name and address. “I don’t know how to repay you.”

Len spots a book on the counter – a sign-in book of sorts, open to a page with five other names on it – and pushes it Barry’s way. “If you wouldn’t mind signing up for our email list, that would be a big help.”

“Yeah. Sure,” Barry says, attacking the page with the flower pen. “Do you…only want my email address,” he asks in a slightly leading tone, “or…?”

“Well, a cell phone number’s always welcome…” Len leans one-armed against the counter and watches Barry add his name to the list “…in case we need to contact you, tell you your order’s been delivered or…if there’re any _specials_ going on…”

“Oh…yeah…of course…” Barry adds his digits, a rosy blush heating his cheeks. “There you go. And again, thank you so much for this.”

He hands the pen over to Len, who pulls it slowly from Barry’s fingers.

“Anything to help out in the noble pursuit of revenge.”

Barry waves, walking backward towards the door. “Bye.”

“Have a nice day.” Len watches Barry hit the door awkwardly with his back and push it open. He keeps watching as Barry waves again, then turns and races down the street.

And God, can that kid run.

“Hey, Mick! Stop tinkering with that safe. I think I got us a bigger job than these nonexistent diamonds of yours.”

“Really?” Mick asks, only mildly surprised.

“Uh-huh…” With his eyes trained on Barry blurring into the crowd, Len tears out the page from the open book and stuffs it in his pocket “…and…I may also swing myself a date.”


End file.
